I’ve spent a day playing around with my iPad now, and I still think I’ve only barely scratched the surface of what it can do.
I’d like to write a quick blog post here on all of the things that went through my head as I was opening the box and cranking it up; all of my first initial impressions of using my iPad for the first time.

When I pulled it out of the box, I immediately thought it felt heavier than the other iPads I’d held before. Granted all of the other iPads were WiFi only models, and the Apple site does say that the 3G version is 0.05kg heavier, but I didn’t think I’d actually notice (Or maybe I’m just crazy ). Upon picking it up and holding it in my hand, it felt really nice. The brushed metal back and the sapphire glass front are really smooth and they both felt really nice to the touch.

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I thought I’d just fire off a little post on what happened today.

I went and bought an iPad 3G 64GB.

While I’m extremely happy to have an iPad now, what I had to go through to actually get one as of today miffed me a little bit.

I originally ordered my iPad from the Apple website, however I was told I wouldn’t receive it until June 7 (Still more than a week away!). When I jumped online today, I found that most electronic consumer shops in Perth were fully stocked to the brim with iPads, ready to purchase right then and there. So I immediately jumped up, ran over to my nearest JB Hi Fi and bought my iPad from there. I then returned to my desk and instantly canceled my June 7 pre-ordered one.

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In a follow-up to the article I wrote on the Wikipedia Microsoft Points article, here’s the chart that originally got deleted. Hopefully if everything else all fails, the chart will still be accessible, at least through here.

I had a rather enlightening experience involving editing a page on Wikipedia last month. When an edit conflict arises, it’s a pretty interesting situation. Wikipedia is set-up not as a voted democracy, but such a way everyone reach a consensus on the changes, else you incur the wrath of the admins. Here’s my story on my first ever foray into it.

When I was building my MicroPoints iPhone app, the primary source of information on the Microsoft Points conversion rate came from the Microsoft Points Wikipedia page. At the time, the article had displayed a chart on the MSPoints conversion rates.
Of all the research I had done online, this was one of the most comprehensive places on the internet that dealt with the conversion rates. As such, I based most of my conversion metrics on this chart.

Shortly after I released MicroPoints, I went back to the page to find this chart missing.
Checking the editing history, I found that another Wiki user had deemed the chart as a potential advertising and deleted it. I thought this was in error, and undeleted it stating it was a demonstration of currency conversion, as per any other currency page on Wikipedia. The other user said that this didn’t justify its presence on the page, and proceeded to remove it. In what I could probably call a rather n00bish move on my behalf, I nearly sparked an edit war by continuously restoring it,  with the other user removing it.

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I think it goes without saying that I really love Steam. I wrote a little piece a while back on the pros and cons of digital distribution in regards to Steam, and I’m still finding it cheaper, faster and easier than anything else. On that note, Valve blessed us with another couple of huge additions to Steam this week…

Steam now has a Mac client, all Source engine games (and some third party ones) are being ported to it, and it’s free for PC users who already own the games. (And just to be super-awesome, they made Portal free for a limited time to celebrate. )

Just to put it out there, I don’t think mere words can cover how truly epic this is. This is a pretty epic thing.

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